90 horses, five donkeys, & three alpacas found allegedly starving but still alive
WALLAND, Tennessee; CLEMENTS, YUCAIPA, MERCED, California; OKLAHOMA CITY, Oklahoma––Murder is far from the only other criminal offense commonly associated with cockfighting, but the January 27, 2025 appointment of Maryville, Tennessee attorney Rick Clark to represent convicted cockfighter and triple murder suspect Johnny Ray Wilburn, 56, temporarily took the spotlight away from other cockfighting-related activity that has already killed 130 million chickens in the U.S. alone, 13 million of them just in January 2025, and could kill a lot more people than every cockfighting murderer combined.
And that is not even to mention 53 dead horses found as result of a cockfighting bust in California.
(Blount County Sheriff’s Department)
Motion to raise bond from $750,000
“Blount County District Attorney General Ryan Desmond said his office has filed a motion to increase Wilburn’s bond,” originally set at $750,000, “but declined to discuss the issue in court,” reported Mathaus Schwarzen for the Maryville Daily Times.
Wilburn is charged with killing Cas Ivan Farley, 61, Delmar Marty Farley, 59, and Norma Kay Farley, 65, on January 19, 2025, and then burning their house down.
“Norma Farley’s niece told WVLT News that Wilburn is Norma’s ex-husband’s son and was staying with the family a few days before the fire,” reported Josh Jarnigan of WVLT News in Jackson, Mississippi.
SHARK pressure apparently cancelled cockfight in Mississippi
ANIMALS 24-7 initially described the Wilburn murder case beneath a summary of a Showing Animals Respect & Kindness [SHARK] appeal for calls to Lee County, Mississippi sheriff Jim Johnson, about “an illegal cockfight,” near Baldwyn, Mississippi, “planned for the D.L. Parker pit January 25, 2025.”
The appeal for calls was apparently successful, as Showing Animals Respect & Kindness informed ANIMALS 24-7 the following day that the cockfight was cancelled.
13 horses, a donkey, & a bull were euthanized
Meanwhile, Madisen Keavy of CBS News in Sacramento, California, reported that as result of a cockfighting investigation near Clements, in the San Joaquin Valley, “Volunteers spent two days rescuing dozens of horses and other animals at the center of an animal abuse investigation.
“According to the San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office,” Keavy wrote, “90 horses, five donkeys, and three alpacas were rescued, while 53 horses, one cow, and one dog were found dead.
“Thirteen horses, one donkey, and one bull had to be euthanized,” Keavy said.
“These numbers are subject to change, according to authorities, as the investigation is still active and ongoing,” Keavy added.
“Possession of a short-barreled shotgun”
“The sheriff’s office said law enforcement officials first made contact with suspect Jan Johnson in August 2024 after reports of neglect,” Keavy recounted. “At that visit, she allegedly threatened deputies.
“Then, on January 4, officers responded to a report of a rooster fight at one of Johnson’s three properties near Clements. Officers discovered 30 dead roosters and 65 who were alive.
“A spokesperson for the sheriff’s office told CBS13 that Johnson was not associated with the rooster fight and was not at the home at the time, but because she was the owner of the property, authorities were able to get warrants to search her primary home and others. “
Johnson was reportedly jailed on charges which, as well as neglect of animals, included “threatening a public official, other criminal threats, and possession of a short-barrel shotgun.”
Second big cockfighting bust in California within three days
The Clements cockfighting raid came three days after the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department “arrested two men, detained 33 others and seized more than 200 fighting roosters, U.S. currency and dozens of firearms” at a cockfight in Yucaipa, California, 430 miles south.
“An estimated 50 vehicles were on the property when deputies arrived, with many of the occupants attempting to flee the area, authorities said,” reported Josh DuBose of KTLA television in Los Angeles
“A suspect, later identified as 33-year-old Riverside resident Jose Adame, accelerated toward San Bernardino County Sheriff’s patrol unit, narrowly missing a deputy, who then initiated a pursuit.
“Adame eventually stopped his vehicle,” DuBose continued. “He and three passengers were taken into custody. Inside the vehicle, which was later impounded, deputies recovered six live roosters in the rear cargo area,” according to a San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department media release.
Ruger semi-automatic
“An additional 33 people identified as spectators of the illegal operation were detained at the property,” DuBose narrated, “where authorities found 250 roosters, a fighting ring with a scoreboard, and steel talons, typically placed on rooster’s claws during the illegal fights.”
Suspect Carlos Romero, 35, was found “hiding in his truck with seven live roosters inside boxes,” DuBose added, “in possession of a large sum of U.S. currency and a Ruger semi-automatic handgun.
During a property search, DuBose continued, “Additional steel talons were located and approximately 24 firearms were seized from a large safe, officials said.
“Personnel with animal control located an estimated 17 dead roosters, eight live roosters and tagged another 61 boxes of roosters, while inspectors with Yucaipa Code Enforcement red tagged several buildings, including a trailer on the property.
Adame was charged with assault with a deadly weapon, failure to yield, and animal cruelty. Romero was charged only with animal cruelty.
California cockfighting belt coincides with Pacific flyway
A quick look at any good map of California will show that Clements and Yucaipa are both situated along the Pacific flyway, heavily used by migratory waterfowl, with Merced about 70 miles southeast as the ducks fly, and Yucaipa about 330 miles farther southeast from there.
The California cockfighting belt has historically stretched from Sacramento at the northern end of the Central Valley south to Los Angeles and San Diego, directly under the most heavily used portion of the Pacific flyway.
Central Valley cities including Merced, Fresno, and Bakersfield, along with the central California coastal cities of Salinas and Monterey, have more-or-less openly hosted cockfighting and gamefowl breeding since the “Okie” migration of the 1930s Dustbowl era collided with Mexican “braceros” and Filipino farmworkers who were already there.
History of California cockfighters spreading disease
Unlike commercial poultry flocks, raised by the tens of thousands inside gigantic barns, gamefowl are raised outdoors, the hens in pens or coops at least partially open to the elements, roosters mostly tethered in rooster-sized A-frames, just out of pecking reach of each other, to whet their fighting instincts.
Gamefowl are accordingly highly vulnerable to any disease that migrating waterfowl might bring with them.
Illegal cockfighting and transport of gamefowl either produced or spread outbreaks of Newcastle disease with devastating consequences for the California poultry industry in 1971-1973, 2002-2003, and 2018-2019.
The latter outbreak was made much, much worse when U.S. president Donald Trump, then in his first term, during a budget dispute with Congress furloughed most of the federal personnel who could have helped to respond to the outbreak.
(See Disease linked to cockfighting menaces California poultry industry and Federal shutdown helps disease race from gamecocks to egg barns.)
Deja vu all over again
Now the whole catastrophe appears to be happening again, due to outbreaks of the H5N1 avian influenza, also contaminating raw milk produced in the Fresno area, and now apparently mutating into new avian flu variants of unknown possible consequence.
“A rare strain of bird flu, H5N9, has been detected on a duck farm in California’s Merced County,” San Francisco Chronicle reporter Aidin Vaziri disclosed on January 27, 2025.
“The World Organization for Animal Health reported the outbreak,” Vaziri continued, “also noting that the more common H5N1 strain was present at the same farm. In response, nearly 119,000 birds were culled to prevent the virus from spreading.”
First confirmed case of new bird flu in U.S.
Acknowledged the U.S. Department of Agriculture, “This is the first confirmed case of high pathogenic H5N9 in poultry in the United States.”
Summarized Vaziri, “Although H5N9 is uncommon, it raises concerns about the evolving threat of avian flu. The U.S. National Library of Medicine notes that it remains unclear whether this new strain could mutate into a form that spreads to humans.
Warned the National Library of Medicine, “Whether this novel H5N9 virus will cause human infections from its avian host and become a pandemic subtype is not known yet. It is therefore imperative to assess the risk of emergence of this novel reassortant virus with potential transmissibility to public health.”
(Beth Clifton collage)
Justin Humphrey, again
Despite that, and despite the long history of cockfighting as a vector for pandemic disease, Oklahoma state legislator Justin Humphrey, a Republican from Lane in Atoka County, has introduced state house bills 1313 and 1326, to reduce the Oklahoma penalty for cockfighting from a felony to a misdemeanor, and to allow fights between gamefowl and robots.
This is the same Justin Humphrey who has repeatedly introduced bills to reduce the penalties for cockfighting in past legislative sessions, and in 2021 also introduced a bill to introduce a hunting season for Bigfoot.
Said Humphrey, “If I had my choice, I can go over here and stop two chickens fighting, or I can go over here and I can bust somebody dealing heroin. I’m going after the heroin, not after the chickens.”
But cockfighting busts typically nab alleged perps in possession of illegal drugs too, including in Oklahoma in October 2024.
(See Oklahoma cockfighting bust reignites effort to pass FIGHT Act in new Congress.)
(Beth Clifton collage)
Another bill to lower penalties
“Senator Tom Woods, a Republican from Westville, also proposed a cockfighting bill, Senate Bill 1111,” reported Emma Murphy of Oklahoma Voice, “which would reduce the penalty to a misdemeanor and alter the definitions of what it means to participate in cockfighting.
“A first conviction ,” under the Woods bill, “would be a misdemeanor with a $500 fine. A second conviction would still be a misdemeanor, but with a penalty of up to a year in county jail, a fine of $2,500, or both. A third offense would bring the penalty to felony status with a two-year sentence, a $5,000 fine, or both,” Murphy explained.
“Creates options”?
Argued Woods, “This legislation creates options for law enforcement to prosecute this crime more than they do now. Currently, there are very few cases being prosecuted because of the level of penalty assessed with the crime and the burden on law enforcement to take it to court.
“If passed,” Woods said, “this will still be a crime with felony punishments attached to it, while bringing more reasonable penalties into alignment for the offense.”
Kirkpatrick Policy Group spokesperson Brendan Hoover objected that, “Reducing the penalties for cockfighting sends a message that the crime isn’t a big deal.”
Agreed Kevin Chambers, Oklahoma representative for Animal Welllness /Action,
“These bills are simply attempts to make it harder for law enforcement to do their jobs.”
However, the penalties proposed in the Woods bill would be as strong or stronger than those now in effect in 21 states.
Why is the law not enforced?
Currently cockfighting in Oklahoma is a felony, carrying a maximum penalty of ten years in prison plus a $25,000 fine. Possession of birds for fighting, also a felony, can be punished with up to ten years in prison plus a fine of from $2,000 to $25,000.
Attending a cockfight is a misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in jail plus a fine of $5,000. Possession of cockfighting implements, such as gaffs and spurs, is not an offense.
These penalties, among the strongest in the U.S., were introduced by ballot initiative in 2002, were upheld by the Oklahoma Supreme Court in 2004, and continue to be supported in public opinion polls, but in 23 years only 29 cockfighting cases have been prosecuted in Oklahoma under the present law.
On the other hand, the reluctance of rural Oklahoma sheriffs to raid cockfights, even when tipped off that they are going on, suggests that local politics and personal relationships with the cockfighters have a lot more to it than the severity of the penalties.
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